Editorial

Adding Insult to Injury : Bush Says Starving
India Eats Too Much

Karl Marx, born on 5 May, 1818, nearly two centuries ago, had in 1867 laid bare the “intimate connection between the pangs of hunger of the most industrious layers of the working class, and the extravagant consumption, coarse or refined, of the rich, for which capitalist accumulation is the basis” (Capital Vol. 1, Ch. 25). In May 2008, nearly a century and a half later, as we hear Emperor Bush hold forth on global hunger, we are reminded that capitalism and global wealth remains just as intimately wedded to hunger. ...Full text

Cover Feature

Global Food Crisis : Corporate Coffers Full While Stomachs Go Empty

At the moment the whole world is caught in inflation frenzy, with skyrocketing global food prices but the neoliberal diktats are again wrongfully addressing the problem with a slew of monetary policies and bluffing the world with lame reasons for the cause of such an acute crisis. While on one hand, almost every corner of the developing countries have witnessed food riots, on the other hand the corporate biggies are busy counting massive profits expropriated at the cost of falling purchasing power of those teeming millions directly and indirectly linked to farm produce......Full text

India’s New Hunger: When Soaring Prices Empty Your Plates

In conjunction with global food crisis, the inflation rate in India is blowing the roof off; and so far the “betting on a credible monetary policy” has failed to contain the turbulent price rise, which is touching 8% now.....Full text

Commentary

Gems from the CPI(M)’s Coimbatore Congress:
Defending the Indefensible, Reconciling the Irreconcilable

The Political-Organisational Report (POR) presented at the CPI(M)’s Coimbatore Congress marked a declared departure from the party’s usual pattern of Congress documents. For the first time, the POR included a part dealing with the role of Left-led governments......Full text

The Divisive Agenda of the Jaipur Blasts Must Not Succeed!

Yet again, terrorism has targeted Indian people. The serial blasts that rocked Jaipur on May 15 have claimed over 60 innocent lives and injured hundreds. Such heinous acts of terror, aimed at fanning up fear and divisive sentiments, and causing untold pain and destruction, deserve the strongest condemnation and their cold-blooded master-minds, the severest punishment....Full text

ARTICLE

Crisis Engulfs the Global Financial System

Headlines such as “Apocalypse now?”, “The Great American Slowdown”, and “Panic is in the Air” have dominated commercial financial media recently. The US Federal Reserve Bank has thrown its own rule book out the window to not just rescue Bear Sterns but the entire financial system. The British government has been forced to nationalise one of the big mortgage lenders Northern Rock.....Full text

PARTY EDUCATION

Women’s Movement and Communist Party : Basics Revisite

Woman, wake up; the tocsin of reason is being heard throughout the whole universe; discover your rights. … Enslaved man has multiplied his strength and needs recourse to yours to break his chains. Having become free, he has become unjust to his companion. Oh, women, women! When will you cease to be blind?”....Full text

REPORTS

Highlights of CPI(ML) Protest Fortnight Against Price Rise

The CPI(ML)’s fortnight-long all-India campaign against price rise, beginning on 15 April, culminated on May Day with spirited protests all over the country.....Full text

Landless Labourers Seize Land in Mansa

The agricultural workers in Dalel Singh Wala village led by Mazdoor Mukti Morcha and CPI(ML) seized four acres of panchayat land which they decided to redistribute among the landless for building their dwellings. ...Full text

CPI(ML)’s 9th Uttar Pradesh State Conference Held

The 9th Uttar Pradesh State Conference of the CPI(ML) was held successfully on 28-30 April at Comrade Vinod Mishra Nagar (Mirzapur) focusing on the issues of price rise, unemployment, police repression, communalism and corruption in National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS)....Full text

“Create Autonomous State or Jail Us”
Massive Jail Bharo Programme Observed At Diphu

On 17 May, 1986 the peoples of K A and NC Hills, the twin districts of Assam, vowed to intensify the movement for creation of an autonomous council covering the region, by implementing the article 244 A of the Constitution....Full text

Bhagat Singh's Statue Unveiled in Jehanabad

On May 10, the anniversary of the Great War of 1857, Shaheed-e Azam Bhagat Singh's statue was unveiled by Com. Dipankar in the premises of Party district office in Jehanabad....Full text

Spate of Killings in North Cachar Hills

You must be aware of the uninterrupted killings of railway employees and other workers and innocent people over the last one week in North Cachhar Hills District of Assam....Full text

WORKING CLASS

AICCTU Initiative : Towards All India Conference of Construction Workers

An all-India conference of construction workers will take place on June 28-29, 2008 in Patna, under the leadership of AICCTU, to form an All India Federation of Construction Workers. ...Full text

Hunger Strike in Gorakhpur Against Arrests of Sanitation Workers 

On 14 May in Gorakhpur the Administration arrested the Sanitation Workers Union members and CPI(ML) activists who had been on a hunger strike for last five days at the Commissioner’s office, with the simple demand that the Town Corporation take the workers under a direct contract and thereby free them from exploitation by private contractors. ...Full text

Indian Diaspora Workers on the Warpath

Taxi drivers in Australia, (mostly youth of Indian and Pakistani origin) staged a spontaneous and ultimately successful protest on April 29-30, shutting down a major intersection in Melbourne for more than 22 hours, after the near fatal stabbing of a young driver. ...Full text

AICCTU Preparatory Body Formed in AP

On 26th of April an organisational convention of All India Central Council of Trade Unions (AICCTU) was held at Vijayawada.he meeting was presided over by CPI(ML)'s Andhra State Secretary and Polit Bureau member...Full text

Contract Workers in Anpara Thermal Power Project Score Victory

Contract workers in the Anpara Thermal Power Project scored a major victory when the Plant Management, after all its efforts to defame, divide and suppress the 3-month long movement of the contract workers failed. ...Full text

FROM THE STATES

Karnataka Assembly Elections - 2008

If criminalisation of politics was the hallmark of polls in many states in north India, rampant corruption and subdued political campaign marred the recently concluded Assembly elections in Karnataka. ...Full text

Two Years of DMK Rule in Tamilnadu

DMK claims that it has succeeded in fulfilling the expectations of the common man. Its own alliance partner PMK says that the DMK rule has failed on all fronts. Congress, CPI, and CPI(M) more or less accept the claims of DMK on its 2 year rule. ...Full text

AIPWA Statement on Harassment of IPL Cheerleaders

The news that two IPL cheerleaders were kept off the field at Mohali on grounds that they are black (TOI, May 21), is truly disturbing. The issue about cheerleaders has been misplacedly reduced to whether or not they offend the sensibilities of ‘our’ (Indian) society. ...Full text